I really like that idea of the WW cartel aristocrat. Have you had any chance to try it out yet?
The Dandy Cube (Chris Taylor's Cube)
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Chris Taylor
Contributor
Not currently. Hopefully there's a draft tonight!
Good luck! I am also a big fan of the WW aristocrat.
Loving icarus mark ii, that thing is super great.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
A friend of mine helped me template the origional idea of Icarus' Wings. Some complicated mess where if the equipment was destroyed or the creature gained flying again it'd fall to it's death unless it naturally had flying.
I prefer the elegance and non-stupid edge caseyn-ess of this version however
I prefer the elegance and non-stupid edge caseyn-ess of this version however
Chris Taylor
Contributor
[TJS]Dandy_Lions's draft of The Dandy Cube on 02/10/2015 from CubeTutor.com
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Is this deck good? Child of Night here has 0: regen, play once, and plunge into darkness is a B1 instant that is Strategic Planning, Morbid: Strategic planning for 5
Wasn't me. A card is a card. Even the extra ones you get from cultivate. This sort of thing is half the reason to cultivate and right now you're just making it too narrowly a raidcrawler/ bloodghast card.Weren't we all saying last draft how it was really broken because you could just hold on to your 6th land and get a cheaper eternal witness?
I think you made the suggustion to change it
Non 2/1 decks want to rebuy guys too and if you have to discard a card so be it but please let it be a land sometimes.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
I know you don't really need to balance out where the archetypes are based on color (Think guild identities) but I think I want to.
Each color having an even number of things it should be aiming for makes for a nice design guide, and decks don't have to be guided by these.
Anyways, case and point, lets take the structure from Khans of Tarkir (the one my cube is closest to):
Abzan (Main)
Jeskai (Main)
Sultai (Main)
Mardu (Main)
Temur (Main)
Here's the archetype underpinning of my cube currently:
Control (UWB)
Wildfire (UWR)
Pod (GBUwr)
Ramp (Gbruw)
Tokens (WBG)
Prowess (UWR)
Aristocrats (RBG)
Counters (WRG)
It's kinda all over the place. Pod is in Green/Black, but then there's one off good cards in other colors like Blade Splicer, and Flametongue Kavu (but not much else), and even blue is about 50% amazing, with mulldrifter and phantasmal image, and 50% awful for pod, with Frostburn Weird and Phantasmal Bear.
Not only that, some of these archetypes have a lot more heft than others. I've got tokens on this list, but there's not really enough cards to have a dedicated token deck, it's more there to represent the fact that Ajani Goldmane combines well with nest invader and curse of shallow graves.
Here's my idea:
Abzan (Main): Pod
Jeskai (Main): Spells (Wildfire/Prowess fit here)
Sultai (Main): ???Threshold???
Mardu (Main): Aristocrats
Temur (Main): Counters
This loosely means:
White: Pod, Spells, Sac
Blue: Spells, Counters, ???
Red: Sac, Spells, Counters
Green: Pod, Counters, ???
Black: Sac, ???, Pod
Obviously there's a bit of a problem (Holding over from my previous design) that I've got no idea of a direction for sultai that would fit well in the environment I've had a longstanding lack of ideas when it comes to blue/green, so I'm not wholly surprised. Luckily, in a cube like mine you can be lazy creative, so fear not for the lack of cards available to support a deck that likes to play out of the graveyard.
I've put threshold there because I think you can probably make a deck people would like to play out of cards like Werebear, Forbidden Alchemy, Tarmogoyf, and something like Rakshasa's Secret. Normally I think delve would be a great idea, but cards like Tasigur and Treasure Cruise tend to run counter to the whole werebear thing, and I worry about encouraging players to see just how deep they can go on "how many broken delve cards can I fit in my deck?"
Regardless, I'm open to suggestions.
On the other hand, I've got piles and piles of ideas for the rest:
Moving the counter deck from Naya to Temur basically involves moving all the white cards to blue ones, and while I mourn the loss of Ajani Goldmane, the rest of the white cards I'm removing look to just be otherwise fine cards that happen to involve +1/+1 counters, the easiest thing to create custom cards for.
Abzan Falconer shifts easily to blue, since flying is in both colors anyways:
I figured I wanted a slightly better way of giving it a counter (since nobody ever outlasted falconer). I'm variable about the monstrosity cost, but I like the flavor of the firebreathing, and I still think it's good enough to see play in UG decks.
Continuing on "Learning from volt charge", we'll need a (likely 3cc) proliferate spell that you can use in a wide variety of situations:
White had this from before
The only other cards I'm sad about losing are High Sentinels of Arashin, and Mikaeus, the Lunarch. High Sentinels I'm alright leaving by the wayside, since it costs 4 which is a huge issue, and isn't that great a reason to pack your deck full off counter generating creatures. I do like the self synergy it had with handing out counters for mana, but that ability probably doesn't need to be on a giant expensive flier for it to be cool.
Mikaeus is a bit harder. He's a great threat, early source of counters, but isn't as insane as something like Gavony Township would be at that cost. He's on the back burner, and I don't think it's as simple as colorshifting him to green, though that could be an option.
Another idea I had to solidify these color identities is to have little tendo ice bridges in RUG:
Could be a ULD idea, I dunno. And yes I could use the vivid lands but fuck lands that ETB Tapped.
Maybe we could have powerful 3 color cards that incentivise you to stay in these lanes?
That's my idea so far. Am I crazy? Anyone wanna help me flesh out these ideas?
Each color having an even number of things it should be aiming for makes for a nice design guide, and decks don't have to be guided by these.
Anyways, case and point, lets take the structure from Khans of Tarkir (the one my cube is closest to):
Abzan (Main
)Jeskai (Main
)Sultai (Main
)Mardu (Main
)Temur (Main
)Here's the archetype underpinning of my cube currently:
Control (UWB)
Wildfire (UWR)
Pod (GBUwr)
Ramp (Gbruw)
Tokens (WBG)
Prowess (UWR)
Aristocrats (RBG)
Counters (WRG)
It's kinda all over the place. Pod is in Green/Black, but then there's one off good cards in other colors like Blade Splicer, and Flametongue Kavu (but not much else), and even blue is about 50% amazing, with mulldrifter and phantasmal image, and 50% awful for pod, with Frostburn Weird and Phantasmal Bear.
Not only that, some of these archetypes have a lot more heft than others. I've got tokens on this list, but there's not really enough cards to have a dedicated token deck, it's more there to represent the fact that Ajani Goldmane combines well with nest invader and curse of shallow graves.
Here's my idea:
Abzan (Main
): PodJeskai (Main
): Spells (Wildfire/Prowess fit here)Sultai (Main
): ???Threshold???Mardu (Main
): AristocratsTemur (Main
): CountersThis loosely means:
White: Pod, Spells, Sac
Blue: Spells, Counters, ???
Red: Sac, Spells, Counters
Green: Pod, Counters, ???
Black: Sac, ???, Pod
Obviously there's a bit of a problem (Holding over from my previous design) that I've got no idea of a direction for sultai that would fit well in the environment
I've had a longstanding lack of ideas when it comes to blue/green, so I'm not wholly surprised. Luckily, in a cube like mine you can be I've put threshold there because I think you can probably make a deck people would like to play out of cards like Werebear, Forbidden Alchemy, Tarmogoyf, and something like Rakshasa's Secret. Normally I think delve would be a great idea, but cards like Tasigur and Treasure Cruise tend to run counter to the whole werebear thing, and I worry about encouraging players to see just how deep they can go on "how many broken delve cards can I fit in my deck?"
Regardless, I'm open to suggestions.
On the other hand, I've got piles and piles of ideas for the rest:
Moving the counter deck from Naya to Temur basically involves moving all the white cards to blue ones, and while I mourn the loss of Ajani Goldmane, the rest of the white cards I'm removing look to just be otherwise fine cards that happen to involve +1/+1 counters, the easiest thing to create custom cards for.
Abzan Falconer shifts easily to blue, since flying is in both colors anyways:
I figured I wanted a slightly better way of giving it a counter (since nobody ever outlasted falconer). I'm variable about the monstrosity cost, but I like the flavor of the firebreathing, and I still think it's good enough to see play in UG decks.
Continuing on "Learning from volt charge", we'll need a (likely 3cc) proliferate spell that you can use in a wide variety of situations:
The only other cards I'm sad about losing are High Sentinels of Arashin, and Mikaeus, the Lunarch. High Sentinels I'm alright leaving by the wayside, since it costs 4 which is a huge issue, and isn't that great a reason to pack your deck full off counter generating creatures. I do like the self synergy it had with handing out counters for mana, but that ability probably doesn't need to be on a giant expensive flier for it to be cool.
Mikaeus is a bit harder. He's a great threat, early source of counters, but isn't as insane as something like Gavony Township would be at that cost. He's on the back burner, and I don't think it's as simple as colorshifting him to green, though that could be an option.
Another idea I had to solidify these color identities is to have little tendo ice bridges in RUG:
Could be a ULD idea, I dunno. And yes I could use the vivid lands but fuck lands that ETB Tapped.
Maybe we could have powerful 3 color cards that incentivise you to stay in these lanes?
That's my idea so far. Am I crazy? Anyone wanna help me flesh out these ideas?
Remember 3cc spells are your enemy right now and that your cube is suffering from a glut of prowess 2 drops not an insufficiency.
Your brine guy will probably want fewer enchantment based removal spells.
I also noticed recently that your green section has quite a number of cards I like to call "bad impulse" giving green drafters a lot of very low picks in their draft.
Gravity warp seems really bad to me unsplashable at 3cc.
My last point is I find I'm usually pretty remiss playing 3 colours in your cube given all the wastelands and the already heavy 3 section. Sure I'll splash red in a UW deck if the draft goes that way or splash white in my UB but I usually am pretty shy unless I have a bunch of mana artifacts or brainstorms.
Your brine guy will probably want fewer enchantment based removal spells.
I also noticed recently that your green section has quite a number of cards I like to call "bad impulse" giving green drafters a lot of very low picks in their draft.
Gravity warp seems really bad to me unsplashable at 3cc.
My last point is I find I'm usually pretty remiss playing 3 colours in your cube given all the wastelands and the already heavy 3 section. Sure I'll splash red in a UW deck if the draft goes that way or splash white in my UB but I usually am pretty shy unless I have a bunch of mana artifacts or brainstorms.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Would you actually prefer prowess 3 drops? They're my answer to above the curve blue creatures, but you don't end up needing prowess 1 drops since a 1.5/1.5 for 1 is still bad. I think you'd have to try really hard for these creatures to trend towards being just a 2/2 for 2, so they don't really force me to draft this 15 spell deck: they're kinda just decent.
in terms of 3 drops: I'll keep an eye on it. Enough cards will be changing hands with this next patch that it might not be a problem.
Possibly, but I'm not sure I want him counting everything anyways.
I wish the number of enchantment based removal spells was more spread though. White basically has 0 instants/sorceries, and every other color has like 0 enchantments.
Green's Bad Impulse cards are going. I'd hoped seek the wilds was going to be good, but I'm thinking more and more that impulse itself might not be good, or at least not where you want a filler spell like that to be, since brainstorm works so much better. Farseek has proven to be fine, though making it less consistent but having cycling or something might make them less niche.
Gravity Warp could probably be 2U (Disperse+, like Volt Charge is to Searing Spear). Another option is to keep it at 1UU, but let it bounce lands.
RW with a Splash of U is what I'm going for here, since I think it'd take a lot of work and never letting ryan draft with me ever again to actually get my drafters to go for 6-6-5 manabases. The idea here is that you can realistically go UWr, as well as uWR and UwR.
I'm also thinking increasing the number of terramorphic expanse type cards might help with your perceived wasteland problem: letting you splash with wasteland immune lands.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
So in fleshing out the BUG theme, I think I know a bit more about how this is going to work:
a BG deck that involves the graveyard I'm thinking will be a sort of self mill thing:
UG Deck that involves the graveyard will likely be a tempo based graveyard thing. Think UG Madness, or Canadian Threshold from Legacy. I want people to want to play looters here rather than thought scour or dream twist.
But a UB deck? That plays with the graveyard? And wants to play damnation? (I wanna keep these in)
Well....
I know, I know, I'm probably the biggest idiot for doing this after everything I've said about reanimator. It's REALLY hard to balance out how quickly things can be reanimated, how insane those creatures are (Griselbrand, Elesh Norn), and how easy they are to deal with once there (Inkwell Leviathan).
This is also an archetype panned for the zero overlap cards: Who else wants careful study? or Entomb? This is where I think a great deal of the custom cards are going to come from. Nobody else wants careful study, but what about a better strategic planning? And as Jason's mentioned before, you can entomb for bloodghast as well...
It's going to take a lot of looking at my higher CMC creatures. Avenger of Zendikar is perfect, since it's sweet in ramp decks but poor to reanimate. Frost Titan is probably a problem I'd like to head off at the pass. Possibly Grave Titan as well, depending on how well other removal matches up to him. Crater Hellion can probably swap to something more reanimator friendly.
I'm hoping there's enough overlap between these to be interesting. Vengevine becomes a sweet threat for the UG deck that's removal resiliant, and if your reanimator deck has goyfs in it I'm sure you'd be happy.
a BG deck that involves the graveyard I'm thinking will be a sort of self mill thing:
UG Deck that involves the graveyard will likely be a tempo based graveyard thing. Think UG Madness, or Canadian Threshold from Legacy. I want people to want to play looters here rather than thought scour or dream twist.
But a UB deck? That plays with the graveyard? And wants to play damnation? (I wanna keep these in)
Well....
I know, I know, I'm probably the biggest idiot for doing this after everything I've said about reanimator. It's REALLY hard to balance out how quickly things can be reanimated, how insane those creatures are (Griselbrand, Elesh Norn), and how easy they are to deal with once there (Inkwell Leviathan).
This is also an archetype panned for the zero overlap cards: Who else wants careful study? or Entomb? This is where I think a great deal of the custom cards are going to come from. Nobody else wants careful study, but what about a better strategic planning? And as Jason's mentioned before, you can entomb for bloodghast as well...
It's going to take a lot of looking at my higher CMC creatures. Avenger of Zendikar is perfect, since it's sweet in ramp decks but poor to reanimate. Frost Titan is probably a problem I'd like to head off at the pass. Possibly Grave Titan as well, depending on how well other removal matches up to him. Crater Hellion can probably swap to something more reanimator friendly.
I'm hoping there's enough overlap between these to be interesting. Vengevine becomes a sweet threat for the UG deck that's removal resiliant, and if your reanimator deck has goyfs in it I'm sure you'd be happy.
Whattt when did this happen? Or was it the second one? I'm running double
Reported. Don't need this kind of crap here
lol yeah
Just noticed this guy:
How's it feel? I've been running a green version where the battlecry is constellation, which hasn't been broken, but I don't think anyone's really put it in an enchantment deck yet.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Snapcaster is a 3 drop, thank you very much
lol yeah
Just noticed this guy:
How's it feel? I've been running a green version where the battlecry is constellation, which hasn't been broken, but I don't think anyone's really put it in an enchantment deck yet.
He's been good. Feels like War-Name Aspirant or 2CC bloodthirst creatures, but with a bit more flexibility, since you can blink it and spread the power out.
I don't think so. I'm just saving images en masse, so I've got the name of the artist on the bottom there, but I don't have a specific link.
99% of the time, google and going for the deviantart link can work though.
Where are you seeing this? I'm adding a second...
Unless you mean Snap, which I keep waffling between that and Vapor Snag. I don't think I need 2 bare unsummons
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Really don't want delve spells in with Lurgoyfs